Oracle

Oracle

An Oracle has to be born as such to be able to learn the ability. Those that are born with it that do not wish to be as such are simply out of luck. The Oracle is born with the full levels of Precognition and Hypnotism, but little to no control over either of them. Due to this fact they are usually sent to a monastery to learn their abilities before they do any real harm to those around them. They also have a habit of maturing at an accelerated rate, making the three year old as cognitive as a thirteen year old and a thirteen year old as cognitive as a 40 year old. The issue with this is that they learn little to no Social Skills and often do not understand social norms, while knowing everything about the world around them beyond that point. (Oracles are incredibly smart and usually have a photographic or eidetic memory, but can not seem to comprehend social interactions.)

The Oracle, much like the Medium, can pull spirits to them and “borrow” their abilities for themselves. Unlike the Medium, though, there is no point where the spirit can take over the Oracle due to their nature. Nothing can cause the Oracle to lose consciousness, be controlled, etc. outside of the God or Demon-God that they serve. Those that try will get a backlash that will be noticeable as the Oracles are all defended by whichever higher beings they serve. An Oracle that serves no higher being will not be granted this favor, but they will be able to latch on to any higher being that will have them. Once an agreement is struck with a higher being, (These agreements usually involve granting certain powers, protections and abilities to the Oracle in exchange for being the “mouth-piece” for the higher being.) there can not be another agreement struck with another higher being.

The Oracle can not use magic of any sort due to something in their nature and they can not use energy of any sort save that which their higher being has granted them. Should they choose to try either, the backlash would be enough to make them quickly rethink their plans. (All energies will deal the same amount of damage to the Oracle as their attack and Magics will have little to no effect on others and 100% effect on the Oracle. Healing spells would be nice, but can’t be cast on self due to the heal will be altered to hurt and deal damage in this way.)

Oracles can feel attacks coming and can therefor avoid them, regardless of the speed. Oracles can see a distance of 1000 years beyond their own deaths, thus many prophecies are written by Oracles that see what is coming but don’t comprehend what they are seeing. The visions of future events often come in flashes rather than a stream of knowledge and therefor the Oracle has to splice what they see together. This is part of the reason that their prophecies seem so choppy and cryptic. The images they see are often of things that have not been invented yet, or of social norms that are far removed from whatever the social norm would be in this day. Therefor a war between two countries could turn out to be nothing more than a training exercise between them and the Oracle simply misunderstood what they were seeing. This is the reason that most of the Oracles future sights are used within their own life time. They can tell if an area is plagued with something, rather or not it is due to a displeased God, or if it is simply something that has happened and will pass. They can tell if a particular king is going to be a good king or bad king depending on the future that they see for them. They can tell if a baby will be this type or that type and what the baby will grow to become.

The Oracle does not deal in generals like the Medium or the Precognitive. The Oracle sees everything as a single thing, thus history is one great big book all mashed together. If they are trying to look at a single life, they will see all the lives that are entwined with that life. Thus it is like trying to look at the center of a yarn ball that has been noted throughout and wound tightly together. When they first look, they will see so much that the images will not make since. After a few times of looking, the images will become more and more clear and they can tell more and more about the person, place, or thing. Thus their first reaction to something may be true, but it will rarely be about the thing, person, place itself, but rather something around it, or tied to it. Thus the Oracles try to steer clear of telling future sights of single persons, places or things, but prefer to give general statements of what will come to pass. The events are much easier to see than the single items. (If an Oracle were to go on a journey with a group of travelers, the Oracle would know at the beginning of the trip who would and would not be with them at the end of the trip. He/she could not, however, tell if that person died, left, was trapped, etc. due to the shear amount of things surrounding each individual. They might see the death of the individual, but since Oracles can’t understand time, they may well be looking 100 years into the future when this happens. They may be looking 5 minutes, the Oracle can not tell. The only way they can tell time is if someone literally tells them within the vision. This happens where there is a clock in the vision, or a date, or etc. and the Oracle relays the information, but they do not understand time directly. They can stand in one place for hours and until their body begins to hurt, they will not realize they have been there for more than a few seconds. However, they can be waiting in line for a few seconds and begin to get irate as they believe they have been there for hours.

As stated before, the Oracle is no true fighter. They use their abilities to see future events and pass that info on to their people. If entered into a fight, however, they are no slouch. Sure they may not know how to fight hand to hand, but their ability to avoid being hit is phenomenal. They can not be targeted by any ability. They can not be attacked directly by magic, energy, etc. The area attacks are the only things that will work on the Oracle. The only way to fight them is purely physical, and in that arena they have more than lost the upper hand. Due to their abilities, they can not learn hand to hand fighting and fighting with weapons is even worse. If is never known when they will enter into a trance to see future events and thus focus on normal, worldly things, is far out of their reach. Also, touching others causes the Oracle to enter a trance and see the future of that person, thus they would not be very good at hand to hand. When they pick up an item, the same thing will happen, thus they are less than effective with weapons as well. They are, however, extremely good at training animals, due to their ability to learn so many future events, they can use an ability called Domestication Forceality. This ability allows the Oracle to domesticate any creature they control and give it the impression that they have been together for as long as the animal will live. Thus, the animal, creature, etc. will become as friendly as the loyal dog and defend the Oracle to the death. Beware the Oracle’s pets. They can become extremely powerful because of this ability, the pets can not be the target of spells, abilities, etc. either as they know when the attack is coming.

Note: The Oracle hates to touch anything. They try wearing body suites, gloves, etc. but the transmission of the sight will not be stopped. The moment they touch another person, pet, etc. they see the futures through their touch and can not stop the feeling emotions, etc. of the transfer. This gives them an edge in battles, but is a hindrance in simply living.

Note2: Every time the Oracle sees a future, the future they see they will see through the eyes of someone that will live it. When they do this, they feel everything and go through everything that the person goes through. Thus every time they look into a future event, they are living an entire life in a mere second or two. If they see the death of the person, they will actually feel what that person felt in that moment, this is the thing that drives most Oracles mad.

Note 3: Oracles can live for hundreds of years, but after a few decades, most will go mad. This is due to the ability to see futures and feel everything that happens within those futures. Once mad, they are still the mouthpiece of the higher being they serve and will continue to tell their people what the higher beings wants of them, but their normal daily interactions will be framed through the lens of a mad person. This makes their prophecies of the future hard to understand and often cryptic, if not outright delusional. Be ware the prophecies of such beings as they may not reflect what every expects.

So far there are only two Oracles that have ever lived that have not, at some point, gone mad. Though that is a relative statement with both of them, because both can be considered insane in one way or another. Those two are Xantor and Mara. Brother and sister that have spread their prophecies far and wide and have apparently seen from the beginning of time to the very end of time. Both have a prophecy and both are intertwined with one another, but no one knows if either are real or just the ravings of the mad.

 

Note 2: Diplomacy will not work on an Oracle. No matter how high the Diplomacy, the Oracle has already seen through the character and knows what they are truly after and thus it will not work. Lie will not work on the Oracle either as they see what the true truly is. (See Diplomacy, Lie)